“I’m just a brand, standing in front of a customer. Asking them to love her…”

^ So goes the career of a marketer.

Whilst I maintain that strategy is learning how to professionally flirt (no, not like that), it is perhaps even more true of Customer Marketers whose job it is to grow the value of a brands’ existing base through one thing: love. 

EMOTIONS FTW

No. I’m not suggesting that customers ‘love’ brands. (This isn’t The Drum.)

But I am saying that when we can appeal to more customers’ emotions, research shows that claimed satisfaction increases - beyond ‘hygiene’ transactional factors. 

That’s right, beyond just giving people more STUFF. 

Particularly in categories like FMCG where the modus operandi is “I see it, I buy it, I use it.” Where’s the relationship in that?

Unless, you know, Gift Giving is your love language (😳)

• We’re talking about relevancy (“That colour blue really makes your eyes pop 👀”)

• We’re talking about tenure recognition (#5YearAnniversary #BoyDidGood)

• We’re talking about giving something for nothing (Acts of Service, anyone?)

• We’re also talking about living & sharing their values (The Leo rising to my Capricorn moon)

When a brand can create emotional propositions, it doesn’t just pull in a bunch of new customers. It also makes people stick around for longer.

FINDING A GOOD FIT

Loyalty, like dating, has to be a two-way street. And like the direct marketing / dating maven that I am, I have a model to fit this dynamic perfectly…

Much of dating is about compatibility. Or at least, compatibility in theory. 

Similarly, proposition design is made of two halves: what the brand can give and what the customer wants. Your sweet spot is the middle ground. 

What this gets at is personal utility - perhaps the most important and underused tool in loyalty’s toolbox.

Personal Utility is ultimate helpfulness, on a customers’ terms, made for the customer - served up to them, rather than making them go and find it. But it is always very much within the brand’s gift, to give it to them.

This is where you pull out the big guns and ‘white knight’ that customer like they’ve never been white-knighted before. 

We’re not saying that once a brand wins their customers’ favour that they never look elsewhere - after all, customer loyalty hasn’t ever been monogamous…

But the concept of monogamy leads me rather deliciously to my last point.

HOW TO LOSE A CUSTOMER IN 10 DAYS

Like any bad date where you’ve had one too many martinis, loyalty is often littered with heavy acts of desperation. 

Of course, the worst sin in dating, as in customer marketing, is to be beggy AF. It’s a massive turn off. And it pushes people away faster than a bad smell on a warm day.

• Give us ya email address? (Ew)

• Fancy a discount in exchange for ya data? (Bore off)

• *Sends 100,000 emails to you a day* (Ick ick ick)
  

Instead, we should look to emulate the exchange from the (severely underrated) cheese-fest that is The Tourist…

Elise : Invite me to dinner, Frank?
Frank Taylor : What?
[Elise gives Frank a look]
Frank Taylor : Would you like to have dinner?
Elise : Women don't like questions.
Frank Taylor : Join me for dinner.
Elise : Too demanding.
Frank Taylor : Join me for dinner?
Elise : Another question.
Frank Taylor : [thinks for a moment]  I'm having dinner, if you'd care to join me.
[Elise smiles at Frank] 

“We’ll be over here, doing this thing that we’re bloody good at. We’ll be doing it on our terms, but you’re very welcome to come & join in… if you’d like.”

Much confident! … Such sensual!

And how much more alluring? 

It speaks to the body language in which a brand interacts with their customers. 

We’re not asking you to love us. That would be weird.

Instead, we’re going to put all our energy & focus into being the most helpful, confident, secure, lovable brand we can be. 

Less 1990s RomComs.

More Will Smith in Bad Boys. 

TL;DR: Love is the key to long term loyalty. But it has to be a two-way street: what the customer wants & what the brand can give. Don’t be beggy or you'll end up with an “It’s not you, it’s me.” *Unsubscribes*.